


After the Dying Fire

by April_Valentine



Category: The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Awkward Daryl, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Friendship, M/M, Pre-Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-30
Updated: 2015-09-30
Packaged: 2018-04-24 02:51:50
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,102
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4902748
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/April_Valentine/pseuds/April_Valentine
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>At the end of season 2, a missing scene between Rick and Daryl.</p>
            </blockquote>





	After the Dying Fire

[](http://s259.photobucket.com/user/AprilValentine_bucket/media/dyingfiretitle_zpsrd21woct.jpg.html)

 

“This isn’t a democracy any more.”

With those words, Rick stalked off, away from the campfire, away from the group who hadn’t taken him up on his invitation to leave and strike out on their own without him. Accusing looks followed in his wake.

Daryl couldn’t believe the expression on Lori’s face, the anger, the hatred. Sure, Carl was upset, crying from finding out his dad had killed Shane – of course the kid couldn’t understand the complicated shit that had been going down between his parents and the man he idolized. 

But Daryl understood. He had seen the way Shane had tried to undermine Rick every chance he got, never listening to what the rest of the group wanted to do about Randall, even after they had agreed at Dale’s funeral they wouldn’t kill him. And he had witnessed the stuff that had gone on between Shane and Lori before Rick found the camp. He knew Lori had really thought Rick was dead and she had been loyal to her husband since his return, but he hadn’t missed the looks Shane gave the couple, the jealousy that radiated off the man when he looked at his best friend.

And Carol? What was wrong with her, Daryl wanted to know. Rick had insisted the group continue the search for Sophia. Yet now Carol seemed to think Shane had been right, that Rick wasn’t a good enough leader. Maybe she still blamed him for losing Sophia in the woods, but Daryl thought that was bullshit. Rick had tried so hard to help the girl. And Carol saying he wasn’t a man of honor? Damn, that was harsh. 

Daryl didn’t have the greatest self-esteem in the world, but he knew he was more than just Rick’s henchman. He was his friend. If nobody else was going to follow him into the night after he’d confessed to killing his own best friend, Daryl would be the one to seek him out. He wasn’t good with words – or feelings – but he couldn’t let the man just be out there on his own, hurting the way he was.

He stepped past Carol, aware of the look she shot him as he moved, and headed in the direction Rick had taken. Nobody else was talking. They just all seemed to cave in and sink down beside the dying fire.

Daryl moved quietly through the wooded area, easily not making noise that would startle his friend, despite the abundance of fall leaves on the ground. When he saw the man leaning against a tree, staring up at the moon, he softly called out to him.

“Rick,” he whispered, “’s me.”

Rick turned, and Daryl was aware that he was trying to soften the expression he wore, but his efforts didn’t work. It was easy to see that he was broken, grieving, confused and questioning himself.

“You got something you want to say?” Rick asked, defensively, seeming to dare Daryl to confront him about what he’d said back at the fire.

“Yeah,” Daryl managed, not put off by the other man’s aggressive stance. He stood his ground, folding his arms and meeting Rick’s eyes calmly. “I think you were right.”

Rick opened and closed his mouth a couple of times. If what they had all been through hadn’t been so horrifying, it would have been funny, Daryl thought. But it had been horrible. Terrifying. Sad. So it wasn’t. But Rick was still obviously flummoxed to see someone actually tell him they thought he was right. 

Finally he found words. “Right about what?”

Daryl scoffed. “’Bout everything, man. Keepin’ what Jenner said to y'self. Killin’ Shane. Sayin’ this ain’t no democracy.”

At his words, Rick seemed to crumple in on himself. He sagged against the tree, face torn with distress, and his knees seemed to give out on him.

He rubbed his hand over his forehead that was still streaked with blood. “Yeah, guess I hit the trifecta, didn’t I?” He glanced up at Daryl. “I don’t seen anybody else comin’ out here to give me a prize for it.”

Daryl hunkered down beside him. “No, they’re not. If you don’t want me here, just say so. I c’n see where you might wanta be alone right now.”

Rick shook his head. “No. No, it’s okay.” He sighed deeply. “I didn’t want to be alone. Not really.” He brushed at the leaves on the ground, crumpling them in his hand and watching them fall as he dropped them. “You’d think if a man said the stuff I just said back there, his wife might want to be the one to come after him, wouldn’t you?”

Daryl picked up a stick and nudged at some leaves with it. “I wouldn’t know about stuff like that. Never been married.” He paused. “But I wouldna thought she would be like this either.”

Next to him, Rick seemed to shudder. He drew in a harsh breath and looked into Daryl’s eyes. 

“I killed. My. Best. Friend.” Every word seemed to be agonizing to him. Daryl heard the way Rick had made his confession to the group, not five minutes ago: _I killed my best friend for you people, for Christ’s sake._

“I know I said my hands are clean,” Rick went on after a second. “But are they? I _killed_. A living person. What I said we should never do. And not just some stranger threatening us. My friend…" On that last word, his voice broke.

The raw emotion radiated off Rick like the fire that had taken the barn. Daryl wasn’t good at dealing with things like that, but he felt for this man who had gutted his soul to protect the rest of their group.

“He _was_ threatening us,” he told Rick softly. “I saw the way he kept taunting you. I kept thinkin’, what the hell is wrong with this guy if he has to find fault with every single thing his so-called best friend says and does?”

“Well, he had his reasons,” Rick muttered. “He wanted… he wanted my wife and my son himself. Thought I couldn’t protect them.”

Daryl couldn’t think of much to say to that. “Bastard,” he finally settled on. 

Rick looked at him, half smiling at the tacit understanding. 

The silence stretched a moment. “You know, it got to be pretty disheartening,” he said quietly. “Always bein’ told I was wrong, that I didn’t have what it took. But Lori, she supported me. She even hugged me when I first told what Jenner said. She said she was sure I had my reasons for not telling the group.” His voice started to quaver, Daryl noticed. Rick drew a deep breath and went on. “So when I admitted what happened with Shane, told her how he led me out into the woods, doin’ everything he could to get me angry, to get his chance to kill _me_ \-- and she could see what it did to me to even tell her what happened out there – I thought…" His voice died. He cleared his throat. Tried again. “I thought she would… I didn’t think she’d push me away like I killed a man she… she _loved_ or somethin’.” 

He closed his eyes tight, leaning his head back against the tree, as if desperately trying to control himself. Daryl could only sit there and wait. He felt out of his element, but he knew that at least listening might help Rick 

“She was the one who told me Shane was dangerous, Daryl,” Rick said suddenly, turning to face him. “She was the one who warned me that he thought she and Carl and the baby belonged to him. How can she have known that and now think I…?”

“I don’t know,” Daryl said, never wishing more that he had answers, that he had words to help. He couldn’t stand to see Rick hurting so bad. Couldn’t stand not being able to do anything for him.

“We shoulda taken Randall right away,” Rick said, as if suddenly remembering their plan. “He diverted me. He told me I had to talk to Carl about how my boy felt about the walker killin’ Dale. Like if I was a good father, I should talk to my kid right then and not an hour later. But that was part of his plan. To stop you and me from leaving with Randall. Damnit! It was perfect. Get in another dig about my competency and side track me.”

“Rick…”

But Rick barreled on, “And if we had gone off with Randall, he’d be alive, Shane would be alive and Carl wouldn’t have shot him and the sound wouldn’t have drawn the walkers and the farm… “

“Stop it!” Daryl turned and grabbed Rick’s shoulders hard. “Don’t do this to y’self!” 

Rick was gasping, trembling, losing his grip. All Daryl could think to do was to hold on tighter, shake some sense into him if he could.

“That herd was already on its way. It wasn’t Carl’s fault. It wasn’t your fault. If Shane wasn’t goin’ off half cocked, doin’ what he wanted instead of listenin’ to you and standin’ by _his_ best friend, it wouldn’t have gone down the same way, but the herd would still have over run the farm. And it mighta happened before we got back. Or we mighta seen them coming sooner, had a chance to get out without losing more people. To maybe at least pack some stuff like water and food and shit.”

Rick’s hands came up to grasp Daryl’s forearms. His frantic eyes searched Daryl’s face, clinging to the words he said, desperate to believe him.

“He wanted to kill you,” Daryl told him, never more emphatic in his life. “He wanted what was yours, what he had no right to take. He goaded you into it. He never thought you would, though. He under-estimated you, man.”

Rick drew a breath, his look rueful. “Under-estimated me?”

“You are strong enough,” Daryl told him, not breaking eye contact. “You are a good leader. You did what was right for this group.” His own heart was racing, unused as he was to long conversations and emotional confrontations like this. It was hard for Daryl to meet other people’s eyes, but now he had no problem meeting Rick’s. He swallowed hard, remembering what he had told Carol earlier. “You’ve done right by me, Rick. I… I appreciate that.”

Rick’s face softened at Daryl’s last statement, as if hearing that someone valued him was the last thing he had expected.

“You are a man of honor,” Daryl finished, running out of words but not out of feeling. 

“I tried not to,” Rick said softly, his voice tired, infinitely sad. “I told him so many times that if he just accepted they were my family, things could go back to the way we were, we could stay friends.”

Daryl nodded, letting him talk, glad he seemed calmer at least now.

“I believed we could still be friends. That even after he was with Lori… I could still think of him as my friend. If he really was, why couldn’t he accept that? Daryl, did he think I was weak 'cause I didn’t beat him up for touchin’ her, make him leave the group?”

“I don’t know,” Daryl said, answers eluding him. He sighed, looking deep into Rick’s beseeching eyes. “It’s… it’s the world, man. It’s either bringin’ out the bad inside people, or the good. And Shane had less good in him. Less than you.”

“He was my friend…” Rick gasped out, sagging in Daryl’s grasp, leaning in until Daryl could do nothing but let the man fall against his chest. Rick moaned, but he didn’t actually sob. Daryl figured he was too worn out and too confused to. During the night and all day, there hadn’t been time to process what had happened, what he’d done, what they’d all lost. It was weighing on Daryl too. He’d never had much before the world went to hell. These people, who he wouldn’t have known or hung out with before, were all he had now. Rick was all he had. The one person who actually thought he mattered. He felt awkward sitting there in the dark with the man collapsed against him, but if that was what Rick needed, Daryl drew on strength he hadn’t known he possessed to try to give it to him. 

He’d be embarrassed if any of the others happened to walk up. They’d probably mess their pants if they saw Daryl Dixon holding onto Rick Grimes. But at the moment, Daryl didn’t care. 

Rick drew a trembling breath and shifted against him. Daryl thought he was going to let go, sit back up straight. But instead, Rick’s arms went around him, drawing tight.

Daryl’s breath caught in his throat. He wasn’t used to close contact with other people. Friendship was something out of his experience, real friendship at least. Relationships were completely alien. Anything that required touching, being in somebody else’s space. He remembered Carol trying to pat his shoulder and hug him when he was upset, how he’d yelled at her and pushed her away, her nearness making him regret the open way he’d been with her previously. 

He thought about how she had kissed his forehead when he was hurt, telling him he was just as good as the other men of the group. He’d tried to block it out, not knowing what to make of her gesture. The words had been okay, hard to believe for sure, but still something he had wished hard to be true. 

But he had known that Carol probably had thought there could be more between them and she had pushed him too much. No matter how cordial he felt toward her, the words she had said against Rick tonight had been too much. 

Daryl had always been a lonely man, even when Merle was around. What Carol offered, even if she only meant it platonically, was something he didn’t know how to handle, no matter how much a hug might be, deep down, what he most craved. 

And now, Rick Grimes was hugging him. 

Daryl felt dizzy as the realization sank in. Scared. Not scared. And he didn't want to push Rick away. Not one bit. 

The contact didn’t feel bad though. Even though Daryl wasn’t sure where to put his hands, or how to react, if this was what Rick needed, he could manage. Rick was strong, brave, a leader in all ways. But every man had his breaking point. Every man needed comfort sometimes. And if Rick thought enough of Daryl to let him see him like this, to be able to turn to him this way, the least Daryl could do was to try his best not to let the man down.

He’d come out here to see if Rick needed anything, after all.

Slowly, feeling unprepared, unworthy, Daryl brought his arms up and around Rick’s shoulders. 

Rick groaned again, the sound so needful, so lost, it broke Daryl’s heart. He willed himself to relax, to not let on that being this close to anyone was something he had so little experience with. He let his arms tighten around Rick, offering him whatever solace and understanding he could, hoping he was doing this hug thing right.

Rick reacted by pulling still closer to him. Daryl could feel the man’s hands tangling in the material of his shirt, his breath warm and moist against his chest. And something woke up inside Daryl’s touch starved soul, a small, tenuous flame flickered to life.

Somebody trusted him. Somebody needed him. Rick. A man he admired and felt for and believed in. Rick, who’d been cut so deep by his best friend thinking him weak, yet who was letting Daryl see him vulnerable like this. But being vulnerable didn’t indicate weakness. Didn’t diminish Rick in Daryl’s eyes.

Awkwardly, his own eyes stinging, he patted Rick’s back, aware of the dampness of his shirt, of the way he was trembling with grief and remorse. But patting seemed just not right, like he wasn’t giving as much as he should. So he pulled Rick in, holding him close as he could, amazed that he was what Rick seemed to need.

Being close like this was okay, he realized, the thought so unexpected and foreign he had hardly imagined. Being on his own, needed by no one, needing nothing from anyone, had been his way for so long, he hadn’t known how good it would feel just to be held by someone this way. Daryl really couldn’t remember the last time someone had hugged him. Or that he’d wanted to be hugged. 

Now he soaked up Rick’s closeness like a dry creek bed soaked up the first hard rain. Like he’d been starving and someone had handed him food. Like he was nothing… and now he was alive.

It really only lasted a moment or two. Rick squeezed him hard and with a heavy breath, let go, sitting up and away. He sniffed and rubbed a hand over his face.

Daryl surprised himself by letting his own hands linger on Rick’s back, slower to release him, but Rick didn’t look like he minded.

Rick gave a little cough. “Sorry,” he said, almost too softly to hear. “Thanks.”

“S’all right,” Daryl said, his own voice a croak, as if he had forgotten how to use it. He still felt warm all down his front where Rick had leaned against him. He still felt full instead of empty. 

Rick was looking at him, eyes less haunted now. Not embarrassed, more curious. As if he understood that hugging wasn’t Daryl’s thing and wondered if he had overstepped or made him uncomfortable. 

“Thanks,” he said again, adding, “for listening.”

And by ‘listening’ it was clear Rick meant everything. For letting him vent, for understanding his lapse, for being there. For needing that hug so badly.

“I got your back,” Daryl told him gruffly. 

Incredibly, Rick smiled at him, the moonlight painting him in soft hues, his face so much less tormented than moments before. Handsome, strong. Worth everything. 

Everything.

He had rebuffed the offered closeness of others, yet had allowed Rick to reach for him. Rick had needed the contact, but Daryl had too and it meant more to him than he could ever say. He knew now that he would give this man whatever he needed: a shoulder to lean on, a hug, the blood from his veins. All his loyalty, all his strength, everything he could. Always. 

Daryl felt good.

**Author's Note:**

> I updated the tags to m/m and Daryl Dixon/Rick Grimes, because yes, it is pre-slash, even if Daryl doesn't know it himself yet.
> 
> In my mind, if this were to continue, they would very gradually get there.


End file.
